Port Tobacco times, and Charles County advertiser., 1887-03-11
farmers' Column.
Give fools their gold X knaves their power
Let fortunes bubbles rise and fail;
Who sOws a Fl eld or trains flower.
Or plants a tree. is more than all.
Available Fertilizers.


Manure is the working capital of
the farmer. There is in all tillable
land considerable stock of latent fer
tilizer which requires better conditions
to enable crops to use it. Very rarely
and never e1ceptin market gardening,
is this inert fertility increased while
cropping continues. Nearly all farm
operations on the soil, plowlng, cultl-
waiting and draining, have the effect
of making latent fertility available,
and are benefit mainly because Of
that fact Few farmers can afford to
purposely add to the stock of latent
fertility in the soil. We do this, how
ever, whenever coarse manure is used
in large quantities. If all the manure
needed can be got, the more freely they
are used the better. But with the linn
tied supply that any farmer has be is
obliged to use it carefully, applying
only where it will give the best and
quickest returns.
1t is this quality of being immedia-
tely available that has made CONNER
cial fertilizers SO popular. 1t has been
only by availing themselves of these
that majority of Eastern farmers
have been able to maintain competi-
tion with the cheap virgin lands of the
West. So long as the price of grain
was kept up to point where the in
creased crop would more than repay
the cost of the fertilizers there could
be little doubt about the advantage of
using them But with wheat as low
as it has been for year past there are
many places where the increase in the
crop will not always do this. If the
fertilizers are still TO be used it must
be in a way to make other slower man
ures more quickly available. If barn
yard manures could be made to give
their full benefit to the first crop they
would be generally recognized as the
cheapest fertilizer that can be used.
The true way to use commercial fer.
tilizers is in connection with the barn
yard and stable manures. The caustic
acids and alkalies employed in making
phosphate available are equally effici-
ent when applied to the coarser man
ures Of the barnyard. In most mineral
manures an excess of the acid remains
after the bone or other material is dis
solved; and it is to this, acting on the
vegetable matter of the soil and max
ing it fit for plant food, that mineral
mauures owe their best effects. If
commercial manures furnished the
food directly to crops, they would be
equally beneficial on all soils of mod
crate fertility. This every farmer who
has had much experience with them
knows is not the fact. On light sand
or gravel. where but little vegetable
matter is found mineral manures are
often paratively of little value
Tnere rs nothing in such soil for the
sulphuric acid of the phosphate to
work on. With plenty Of vegetable in
the soil some of it is decomposed. and
its nitrogen is changed to soluble nj
tric acid, one of the most active stim-
ulents to plant food that it is possible
to apply.
Using sulphuric acid in dilute form
on stable manure may often be pro-
fitable means of making it more quick
ly available. But sulphuric acid, oil
of vitriol, is to expensive to come into
general use as manure. There are
cheaper. though less efficient substi-
tutes. Alkalles, like potash or salt,
are powerful disintegraters Of vegeta-
BILE matter, and in some forms are now
the cheapest means of digesting, or
rather cooking, raw food for plants.
Many good farmers use salt mixed
with phosphate to make it more quick
ly available. There is still better rea-
son for mixing salt with stable man
ure for the same purpose. because this
alone is slower in its effects than are
mineral fertilizers. Potash in wood
ashes or in the potash salts is also
good, but in ashes it is too caustic to
be applied to manures out Of the soil,
for it will cause rapid loss Of the am
monia. But in the ground the quick
decomposition of manures is an advan
tage. Ammonia cannot escape as it is
absorbed by the soil and held until
claimed by plant roots.
In soils where vegetable matter is
abundant, lime can often be used as
the cheapest fertilizer. 1t decomposes
humus very rapidly, and will have the
same effect on coarse manures buried
in the soil. Undoubtedly all of these
methods of making manures more ef-
fective draw On the stock of latent fer.
tility in the soil; but this fault, if
such it be, is incident to all cropping.
1t is better, while the present prices
of farm products prevail, to get along
as cheaply as possible, while yet main
tanning full average Of crops, or per-
haps increasing them. Those who
have money to spare can buy expen-
sive fertilizers. Those who have lit
tie money should try to accomplish
the same result by cheaper means
Few farmers have yet attempted to
exhaust the home supply Of fertilizers,
and it is true that those cultivators
who make the most barnyard manure
are frequently the largest purchasers
of commercial fertilizers. They be-
lieve in making the land rich for crop
ping.-Americ0n Culhvat0r.
Agricultural Notes.